NO, I don’t agree with you AT ALL! You don’t understand load paths, and are an danger to yourself and shouldn’t ever attempt any DIY. Any 200K+ project like that shouldn’t stint on spending the first 1K for a structural engineer. 1/200th of a project budget is a very VERY small insurance policy for keeping the house standing.

To complicate matters, homes aren't always constructed according to the original plans. It's rare to produce as-built drawings in residential construction. For this reason, structural questions are best answered by a professional who can visit your home, verify the existing conditions against the plans, and advise you accordingly.

"Do you all agree with me that none of the interior walls are load-bearing/structural, and that I should be able to remove them without problem?"

Absolutely not. No.

Why on earth would you want to rely on the internet for a question like that? Hire an engineer so your house doesn't fall down.

Hi all. Thanks for the feedback. I've already consulted a couple of professionals before making this post but I'm not sure I can trust their advice. Unfortunately, there is only 1 structural engineer firm in the area of this rural home, and they are swamped and booking out several months. So I want to get some input on here and see what other professionals think to see if I can get some consensus among multiple professionals. Houzz is usually a good spot for people to duke out multiple opinions, so I figured it'd be good to see if there was any agreement on this topic or not.

You can see wall #2 that I am proposing removing on the right side of this picture with the framed opening of the pocket door. You can see a part of wall #3 in the left side of this picture below; it runs behind the chimney, has an opening, and then (off picture) closes back up and runs perpendicular into the exterior wall. We are taking out the chimney because it is damaged and not worth repairing. If wall #3 is structural as BobH states, then I suppose we can have a professional calculate what kind of beam might need to go there. I don't actually know what's in the header of that opening, it would be interesting to see what's inside.

Would you really consider removing (potentially) load-bearing walls, on the advise of random internet strangers? Some of whom (like me) may know nothing at all???
Get advice here about decor, furniture arrangements, paint colours, etc etc.
But leave structural/safety advice for the pros.

Just because a wall doesn't support a roof load, doesn't mean that other loads aren't supported by it. Number one would be your ceiling. Drywall and ceiling joists weigh quite a bit, and generally arent going to be able to span large dimensions without an intermediate wall to rest them on. They can also provide lateral stabilization, which is key to seismic and high wind rigidity.

Winging something like this is maximally foolish.

"Unfortunately, there is only 1 structural engineer firm in the area of this rural home, and they are swamped and booking out several months."

Make an appointment for a few months from now then. Do you think this firm would be comfortable looking at your plans via email and deciding this? If the answer is no, why would random strangers on the Internet be trusted to do so?

LWO is totally correct on this. Even if you could see from the attic space that the wall doesn't go all the way up to the roof you still have to support the ceiling joist. Besides being under sized to span that distance they might just sit on the wall and go all the way through to the next room. You would typically use engineered I-joist for a long open span. Almost anything like that can be opened up if supported correctly. Attaching the ceiling joist with hangers to the correct size beam (flushed into the ceiling) and post set up would be one way to go. If lateral forces are something that needs to be addressed you may need some shear wall in some places.

IMo you wait until you get an engineer to tell you this is not a question to have answered on the internet. There will be load bearing walls and if you decide to do this without advice you can expect what happened to our neighbors where the house literally collapsed because he would not listen to anyone.

Hi all,

Yes I get the risks involved, which is why I'm taking the time to try to get as much technical input as humanely possible before doing anything. Certainly it would have been much more risky of me to go right ahead and make structural changes without that. Repeating over and over that I shouldn't be asking the internet isn't doing anything. I appreciate those of you such as BobH, live-wire_oak, and jdesign_gw who actually share helpful, technical information for me to look into.

To be clear, I've never planned to go ahead and dive into demo based on the conversations here. I didn't mean to give that inaccurate impression. This is just a sounding board to try to collect information. I am continuing to contact local professionals who can come see the house in person.

C

Hey Christina:

Think of the comments as "tough love", not chastising. :-) We're concerned for you and are advising you against making a costly mistake. Your house isn't going anywhere. Get in the queue for the structural engineer, or reach out to a couple of architects who may not have such a backlog and could give you equivalent professional advice. This isn't a question for crowdsourcing; plans are just that--plans. Doesn't mean the house was actually built as drawn.

Good luck.

Even if some of the walls are load bearing, there are ways to compensate for it structurally so that you can still remove them. It will just cost more. So go ahead and think about the plan you want, without those walls, while you're waiting for a pro to look at it on-site.

"Houzz is usually a good spot for people to duke out multiple opinions..."

What? You don't need multiple opinions; you need facts! And you can only get facts from an onsite inspection.

This isn't a question of 'Does this sofa make my butt look big?'. This is structural engineering, about which there are no opinions. Do it right or don't do it at all; those are the only two options.

Get on the engineers' schedule; call them tomorrow.

Christina

I'm not advising you to go ahead without having someone qualified access the situation but this isn't rocket science either. I f you want to understand more of what's involved look at "Simpson" hardware. Joist hangers, beam saddles, post and beam connectors. These are the types of things that you would use for something like this.

Edit: looking at house plans this is a little more involved than a one level structure. You really need to make sure it's done correctly.

Opinion shopping. You can always get the answer you want here and sometimes the truth.

Structural engineer required.

Most of the walls going side to side, most of the center section appear structural. Two story walls are almost always structural. Lots of post and beam in this plan connecting the basement footings to roof bracing.

Floor spans will be pretty short with conventional roof framing in multiple stories.